1. Field of the Invention
The invention generally relates to a system for monitoring, collecting and concentrating data on site at a plurality of remote sites, for transmitting the data concentrated at each site to a central location and for performing said monitoring, collecting, concentrating and transmitting functions in a manner that is transparent to persons located at a given remote site. More particularly, the invention comprises a distributed monitoring system for collecting television channel tuning data, household purchase data, VCR channel usage data and the like; on site at a plurality of preselected households, wherein the system concentrates and transmits the collected data to a central site in a fault tolerant manner, transparent to the occupants of the household.
2. Description of the Related Art
The prior art is replete with various systems and arrangements for monitoring viewing habits and product purchase preferences of television viewers, sometimes referred to hereinafter as panelists. The earliest such systems merely collected data on site for eventual manual collection as to the television channels viewed and the times of viewing for various panels of viewers in order to determine market share and ratings of various television programs. Later, systems came into being for use with cable television systems with two way communications over the cable system between the head end thereof and various cable subscribers. In such a system the television sets are typically interrogated periodically from this central location over the cable, with the channel selection and time information being sent back to the central location and logged for statistical compilation. Such systems have also been used in the past in so-called pay television systems in which billing information is sent over the cable system to a central location from the various subscribers to the pay television system. The prior art also includes such systems in which a memory means is provided at the remote location, e.g. at the television receiver, for accumulating data as to the channel being viewed and time. The accumulated data is then periodically transmitted over conventional telephone lines from the remote locations to the central location, by telephone calls initiated by either the remote stations or the central location.
Systems for remotely accumulating data regarding the habits of television viewers and their qualitative reaction to material have today become important from the standpoint of market research. For example, the effectiveness of television commercials can be monitored by correlating viewing of those commercials with subsequent purchase decisions made by panelists whose viewing habits are being monitored. One manner of achieving this which has been utilized in the past is to have the cooperating panelists keep a diary as to purchase of products. The purchase information recorded in these diaries is then correlated with the commercials viewed by those cooperating panelists. In an alternative arrangement disclosed in the prior art, in areas where universal product code automated check-outs are available, such as grocery stores and at the check-out counter, a cooperating panelist presents a card coded with a unique scanner panelist identification similar to the universal product code symbol on the products purchased. The store's computer can automatically retain such purchase data for subsequent transfer to a market research company computer data base for correlation with the data regarding the various panelists viewing of commercials. Such arrangements of course require cooperation of stores within the area of the panelist locations, and are therefore more suited for limited geographic groupings of panelists in a single locale or city, and are not readily applicable to a national assemblage of panelists extending across an entire country.
In market research relating to commercials and their effectiveness, it also is sometimes important to evaluate the effectiveness of alternative forms of a commercial. One way of achieving this in the context of a cable television system is to split the subscribers or panelists into two or more groups, and then show the alternative forms of commercials to the respective groups of panelists. Correlation of product purchase information regarding those panelists wit the forms of the commercials they viewed can then be used to assess the effectiveness of the various alternative forms of the commercial. The prior art also includes examples of systems wherein certain portions of viewing audience can be selected on a dynamic basis and furnished with substitute programming. Such a system is disclosed, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 3,639,686 to Walker et al. In accordance with that system, an auxiliary television signal is broadcast which contains not only substitute programming, i.e. video signal information, but also control information such as pulse code information for remotely selecting panelists which are to receive the substitute programming. Digital address information is provided for each of the panelists, and the portion of the panelists which are to receive the substitute programming are selected by the pulse code information. The Walker et al patent notes that in selecting the panelists which are to receive the substitute programming, the number of categories available is dependent on the number of digital information bits that are incorporated in the system. A later U.S. Pat. No. 4,331,974 to Cogswell et al also discloses an arrangement for selecting portions of a viewing audience on a dynamic basis and furnishing those portions with substitute programming.
A more recent invention for data gathering with particular utility in market research type applications is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,658,290 to McKenna et al. This patent teaches a system that includes a plurality of remote units which are controlled from a central location. Each of the remote units is attached to a television receiver which is generally but not necessarily attached to a cable system. Each of the remote units can function to determine which of several TV modes is in use as well as to store TV channel selector data, data from an optical input device, and/or data input by viewers representative of the composition of the viewing audience. The data is stored for either later collection by a portable data collector, or for direct transmission to the central location by each of the remote units. A video message for a TV viewer, such as a survey, may be transmitted from the central location and stored at the remote units, for later display on the TV receiver associated wit the remote units. Substitution of alternate programming information may also be achieved by the central control point on selected of the remote units.
The remote units described in the U.S. Pat. No. 4,658,290 are well known in the prior art and are typified by a channel meter, as described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,605,958 to Machnik et al and a VCR meter as described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,633,302 to Damoci.
In sum, a variety of television related metering devices and data collection systems are well known which are placed in a household, monitor TV channel changes, accumulate time on a given channel and other information, and communicate the data gathered to a central computer using dedicated telephone lines.
As TV technology rapidly advances and data gathering needs change (e.g., re cable, VCRs, active and passive people meters, single source purchase meters, etc.), meters change accordingly. Each new meter type must be separately accommodated at the central site, necessitating reprogramming of central site software. Additionally, each meter currently requires the built-in "smarts" needed for collection of data and transmission either to a central household collector or via the telephone lines to the central site.
It would be desirable to have a communications system that is flexible enough to support new meter types and new metering applications as they are identified.
It would also be desirable to have a communications system that is situated in such a manner as to eliminate the need for reprogramming central site software as new meter types and new metering applications come on line.
It would be further desirable to be able to direct a set of relatively "dumb" meters, each having limited data collection capabilities, using a single smart "hub" unit located at each remote site wherein the hub unit handles communication between the central site and the household via a household telephone and wherein communications between the hub and the meters may be accomplished over a variety of communication links such as hardwired, RF or carrier current links.
In effect, it would be desirable to structure a distributed system into a "hub and spoke" arrangement where the hub unit includes a sophisticated microprocessor and memory and the "spokes" are the communication links to the meters. The spoke meters could then be systematically polled and two way communication could be employed to not only permit the spoke meter to upload data, but allow the spoke meter to be remotely reprogrammed from the central site via the hub unit.
It would be further desirable if the monitoring system, structured in the indicated desirable way, collected data in a fault tolerant manner, e.g., could recover from remote location power failures, etc., and be operated transparently with respect to the panelists occupying a remote site household. For example, if the system hub was utilizing the telephone and a household occupant picks up the telephone to make a call, the system should be able to get off the telephone and keep track of the task it was last performing in order to pick up where it left off once the household telephone user, unaware that the system was even utilizing the phone, hangs up.